We just refinanced our home and the bank discovered through the courts that they were two judgements filed against me in the early nineties. The bank knew it wasn't me because the ss# on one was different and the middle initial was different on the other. The thing is that they were listed with my first name and married last name which I didn't take until 1995 several years later than the judgements. The bank said there was no way to have them removed from my file (for lack of a better term) but isn't there some way I can have them removed?

By Mommyof5 on Tuesday, September 5, 2006 - 08:49 pm:

Yes there is. There is another man with a name very similar to my dh's name..this other man's last name has an extra T in that our name does not. He has horrible credit (the other man) and when we bought our house 7 years ago there was a judgment showing on our credit report that we KNEW was not ours. I'm not sure how dh went about getting it removed but I know that he did because our loan went through and it wouldn't have otherwise. Dh is out of town the rest of the week or I would ask him. I am sure that the knowledgeable ladies here will have an answer for you way before then. I just wanted to reassure you that yes it can be fixed.

By Cocoabutter on Tuesday, September 5, 2006 - 09:22 pm:

You would do the same thing as you would if you were the victim of fraud- notify the credit reporting agencies of the error and you should probably get a lawyer.

By Wandilu on Tuesday, September 5, 2006 - 11:53 pm:

You can have things esponged (erased)from your credit.You will need a lawyer to do so.

By Ginny~moderator on Wednesday, September 6, 2006 - 05:09 am:

If it were me, I'd first get my credit report, to be sure these judgments are listed on the credit reports. I would then get a copy of the judgments from the court. And ask the court clerk how long judgments are "good". I know when I was dealing with judgments (as a legal secretary), we had to renew them every 5 years (Pennsylvania) or they were no longer valid.

There are two issues with judgments. If a judgment is valid, it can be exercised when you sell titled property (usually real estate) that you hold in your own name only. (A judgment against only you is not a judgment against your spouse and can't be enforced against anything you hold jointly in most states.) Second, of course, is the issue of having them come up on the court records when you apply for a loan against your house OR when you sell your house. And, of course, there is the whole credit report thing.

If it were me, when I got a copy of the judgments, I would read them carefully. You say that one of the judgments was issued long before you were married but is in your married name, so you need to read the details of the judgment just to make sure it wasn't first issued against you in your pre-marriage name. And the other, of course, has the wrong social security number, so it is clearly not you.

I would then write a letter to the entity that got the judgment and tell them that they have entered a judgment against the wrong person. (If you didn't get official notice that a judgment was going to be entered against you, the entry was probably not legal anyhow, but that depends on your state's laws.) Tell them that if they do not remove the judgment they have improperly entered against you, you will consult an attorney to force them to do so and will seek damages. I don't know how other states do it, but in Pennsylvania, if a business does not remove an improper judgment, they can be penalized for some multiple of the amount of the judgment. Similarly, if you pay off your mortgage and the mortgage company doesn't record that the mortgage is satisfied within a specific period of time, you can get significant penalties from the mortgage company.

On the other hand, if you already have a lawyer that you use, get copies of the judgments, take them to the lawyer, and ask him/her to write a "lawyer letter" to the companies that entered the judgments, instructing them to remove them. It will probably cost you an hour or two of the lawyer's time, at the usual hourly rate, but if you can afford it, it will probably do the job much more quickly and with less frustration.

If you want some help in finding out what your state's laws are, or how to go about this, email me at klipvm at rcn dot com. Remember, while the credit reporting agencies can remove them from your credit reports (can, but may not, depending on what they deem to be the facts), until these judgments are properly removed they will be in the court's records.

By Ginny~moderator on Wednesday, September 6, 2006 - 05:11 am:

Oh, and no, the bank can't remove them from the title search that was done when you re-financed - that's a done deal and is in their records. But if you present the facts to the bank, they almost certainly can (and should) enter an explanatory note on the bank's records.